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Some are influenced by the propaganda of “eco-products”, some out of need, some simply out of curiosity, but today many people, even city dwellers, are thinking about raising quails at home. The main arguments for city residents are the small size and promoted unpretentiousness of quails. But is this so? Here you should take a closer look.
Breeding quails at home for beginners
If there were no quails on the farm before, perhaps you should not start with several hundred quails at once. Although fundamentally quails are not so different from ordinary chickens, they have certain features, at least in the fact that the main flock must be renewed at the age of 8 months, while laying hens are kept for up to a year. Walking is also very desirable for chickens; quails can live permanently in a cage.
It also matters where exactly the quail will be kept. A barn in a private house and an apartment in a city house are not at all the same thing.
Since the phrase “home conditions” usually means keeping quails in an apartment, then this option is worth considering first.
Keeping quails at home
When planning to have quails in an apartment, you need to take into account not only the area that the birds will need to allocate, but also the reaction of the neighbors.
First you need to decide on the desired number of quails. If you only need 5 - 6 quails to get eggs, a large parrot cage is quite suitable. The main thing: the cage should be low and have a large bottom area. An area of 0.5 x 0.7 m is quite suitable. You can choose or make a cage more suitable for keeping quails.
One family of quail is unlikely to displease its neighbors. And if your goal is to get a dietary quail egg, then you can only take quail. Then the neighbors won’t even know about the presence of quails in the neighboring apartment. Quails don't cry.
You can safely get about 20 heads of quails without fear of quarrelsome neighbors. Even if they find out, you can always complain about poor health and doctors’ recommendations regarding the consumption of quail eggs and meat.
Such a battery can accommodate more than 20 heads.
Whether you want to live on a poultry farm is another matter.
From Odessa experience it follows that 50 heads of the main herd of quail are enough to provide for a family. The owner of an Odessa apartment farm does not want to increase the number of quails, since with an increase in the number of quails, the smell from them increases.
For self-repair of a quail flock, an incubator and males are also needed.
On the Internet you can find claims that up to 200 heads of quails can be placed on the balcony.
This is what a battery of cells on a balcony might look like.But with two hundred quails, you should be prepared for increased attention from neighbors. In this case, it will not be possible to get away with stories about poor health and anti-crisis support for the family.
Therefore, the balcony must be tightly closed from prying eyes and have good sound insulation. Don't count on good neighbors. It usually ends as soon as people realize that you have found a way to make money.
In addition, for some troublemakers, the quail mini-farm will stink, even if it is located in an apartment on the 16th floor of a 16-story building, and the troublemakers live on the first floor.
If you plan to set aside an entire room for a mini-quail farm, as in this video, it is better to make friends with the district police officer and inspectors from various regulatory organizations in advance. For example, sanitary and epidemiological stations. Complaints are inevitable. And it cannot be said that they will not be justified.
In the 90s, you could even keep a horse in your apartment. Now the authorities are putting things in order.
After you have decided on the expected number of quails, you need to decide on the purpose breeding and a breed of quail.
How to choose a breed of quail for breeding in an apartment
If you intend to get only eggs, without focusing on the amount of meat, it is better to take Japanese quail. This smallest breed of all domesticated breeds belongs to the egg breed and produces the maximum number of eggs. Egg size correlates with the size of the quail. Eggs from the “Japanese” weigh 7 – 10 g.The breed is the least demanding of all available and is ideal for beginners.
If a family does not consume so many eggs, but loves meat, it is better to have broiler quail breeds: Pharaoh or Texas white. Quail of these breeds are more than two times larger than Japanese quail. The egg production of these breeds is not so bad as to leave the owner without eggs. And the eggs themselves are the largest of all other breeds and can weigh up to 20 g. The disadvantage of these quail breeds is their demandingness regarding feed and living conditions. If you start your journey as a quail breeder with broiler breeds, you may be forever disappointed in this activity.
All other breeds are universal, meat and egg breeds. The most suitable for a beginner is the Estonian quail, which is slightly larger than the Japanese quail and has the same color.
Among the meat and egg breeds, there is the widest selection of quails of various colors. You can choose not only by productive characteristics, but also by the color you like most.
The Manchurian golden quail has a very nice shirt.
Thanks to their piebald appearance, tuxedo quails are easy to distinguish from each other, although this may not matter to the owner of a mini-quail farm.
English quails come in two color variations: white and black.
Black English quail, despite its name, are not pure black. Rather, it's just very dark.
The color of the white English quail is the same as that of the white Texas quail. Quite the opposite, since the Texas White was bred using English and inherited its shirt.
Cell selection
You will have to choose cages after choosing the quail breed, since broiler breeds require cages 10 cm higher than for other breeds.This is the case when we are talking about large livestock and cage batteries.
Craftsmen make cages themselves.
The main requirement for all quail cages is a solid floor (but then it will be difficult to clean) or a fine-mesh grid.
A mesh with a mesh size of 1x1 cm is suitable. Cages for flying birds are absolutely not suitable. For example, this cage, where the bottom is no different in design from the side walls.
There are a great many options for cages where you can place quails. Who has enough imagination and skill for what?
A completely free version of the cage.
And a video with instructions on how to make such cages from boxes.
After breeds, flock sizes and cages, the next step will be caring for quails, since they are few to buy. They also need to be fed and maintained properly.
Caring for quails at home
In general, caring for quails is no more difficult than caring for any other birds or small rodents: cleaning cages and feeding. The only difference is the mandatory collection of quail eggs every day.
Feed and feeders
What you need to consider when caring for quails: the basis of the quail diet is feed. Any additions of greens and worms are only feeding. Feed per bird requires 30 g per day if it is a medium-sized quail, and 40 g per day if it is a broiler breed.
Attention! Before buying quails, you also need to think about where the quail food will be stored, since it is better to buy food in large quantities. In this case, the food storage area should be dry, the food absorbs moisture well.
Quails have a habit of scattering food, so they should either have a feeder with limiters, or an outside feeder with a feed catcher underneath it.
DIY feeders with limiters.
Feeder option on a professionally equipped quail farm.
For better digestion of grain feed, quails need so-called gastroliths in their stomachs - small pebbles that help grind solid food, so quails must have a container with sand in their cage, or sand can be mixed into the feeder. If quails need it, they will choose pebbles.
Drinking bowls
Very often in videos of quail farms you can see nipple drinkers, sometimes with a drip eliminator. The advantage of such drinking bowls is that the water is not wasted and always remains clean. The downside is the financial costs.
Nipple drinkers with drip eliminator
You can also use regular drinking bowls.
Such drinking bowls can be made from scrap materials, but it is necessary to install thick wire limiters to prevent quail from jumping into the drinking bowls.
Lighting
Since quail are birds seeking shelter in thick grass where sunlight is dim, bright lighting causes them discomfort and anxiety. Instinctively, quails believe that they are in an open space accessible to the gaze of a predator. Growing nervous tension provokes quails to fight.
The room where the cages with quails are located should be shaded. If the quail cage is located at the back of the room, then this is enough. No additional shading is required.If quails are placed in a room without windows, a small fluorescent lamp or an ordinary incandescent light bulb will be sufficient for them. There should be twilight in the room for the quails’ comfort.
In the video you can see the construction of cages for quails without excess. It also clearly shows what level of illumination should be when keeping quails.
Breeding and keeping quails in a private house
It is much easier to keep quails in a private house than in an apartment. Firstly, quails there don’t really bother anyone, and the neighbors often also keep various livestock themselves. Secondly, in this case it is not at all necessary to live among quail cages. An outbuilding in the yard can be used as a mini-quail farm.
In the video, a mini-quail farm is set up in an unheated room.
When keeping quails at home, you can ignore the temperature. In apartments it usually never drops below 18 degrees. When kept in an outbuilding in the courtyard of a private house, the outbuilding must either be heated or accept the lack of quail eggs in winter. You also need to protect the outbuilding with quails from drafts, but at the same time provide good ventilation.
If you ventilate from the bottom up, ammonia will rise and dissipate in the air, poisoning the room and harming the health of the quails.
How to breed quails
Breeding quails in an apartment and a private house will differ only in the number of quails hatched.
For breeding egg-bearing breeds, families of 3–4 quails and 1 quail are created. When breeding broilers, there are only 2 quails per 1 quail.
Since domesticated quails have lost their brooding instinct, an incubator will be needed to breed quails.
For beginning owners of a small number of quails, an incubator like this would be suitable.
What eggs to lay for incubation
Non-standard eggs are not placed in the incubator. Very large quail eggs are good as food, but they should not be incubated. There is a high probability of a double yolk in the egg. No one will hatch from such eggs. The picture shows quail eggs that are suitable and unsuitable for incubation.
The average weight of quail eggs should be between 10-14 g, depending on the breed of quail. Small eggs are not incubated; the quails produced from them are too weak.
But at the same time, laid down on incubation quail eggs must be clean, free of droppings and other contaminants. This is achieved by maintaining cleanliness in quail cages.
18 days on incubation of quail eggs and 2 months to raise a replacement for the main quail flock.Don't forget to provide brooders for quail and cages for young quail.
It is better to buy an automatic incubator with adjustable temperature and air humidity, since in the first two weeks of incubation of quail eggs, the temperature in the incubator must be maintained at 37.8 degrees. Humidity in the first week is 50-55%, in the second – 45%. In the first week, the eggs are turned 4 times a day, in the second - 6. From days 8 to 14, the eggs are cooled twice a day for 20 minutes. From the 15th day until the quails hatch, the temperature is reduced to 37.5 degrees, the humidity is increased to 65-70%, turning and cooling of the eggs is canceled.
It is necessary to lay 3 times more eggs for incubation than the planned number of quail heads to be replaced, since 25% of the eggs will be unfertilized or the quail will not hatch at all, some of the quail will have defects, and some of the quail will die. Of the remaining quails, half will be males.
You can collect quail eggs for incubation within 5 days if you store the collected eggs at a temperature of 18°C. In this case, the hatchability of quails will be maximum. The longest shelf life for quail eggs is 10 days. Then the hatchability rate of quails drops rapidly.
Raising quails at home
After receiving a mass of squeaking lumps and the fading of joyful emotions, a beginning quail breeder may well clutch his head: how to raise quail to adulthood in such quantities?
In fact, raising quails is not so difficult, but you need to get a brooder for raising quails, in which you can maintain the temperature within 25 - 28°C, and starter feed for quails.
Practice shows that it is easier for a novice quail breeder to start feeding young quails with special feed for quails, and it is easier for quail chicks to start their lives and survive by eating this feed.
In this case, there will be no need to add finely chopped onions to the quails’ food, supposedly to destroy harmful microflora, while the quails still have no microflora at all, but have intestinal upset from food unnatural for quails.
We must not forget that in nature, quails would start feeding on small seeds, which today replace them with compound feed.
If there is a problem with starting feed in the region, then the quails can be given boiled millet, non-sour (preferably calcined) cottage cheese and grated hard-boiled quail egg.
A quail egg is a must, since feeding chicken eggs can infect quails with salmonellosis.
As the quail grows, the temperature in the brooder is reduced, and fully fledged quail are transplanted into cages and raised to adulthood.
Features of growing quails can be seen in the video. Unfortunately, this video shows the raising of quails in semi-industrial conditions.
From all of the above, we can conclude that directly breeding and keeping quail at home does not require superhuman efforts and the main investments will have to be made not in quails, but in the infrastructure of a quail mini-farm.
